Jacob Jurg
Voorspelbaar
Het IMF dat de groeiverwachtingen verlaagt is wel nieuws, maar gezien de ontwikkelingen de laatste tijd ook weer niet: “IMF Sees Rising Recession Risk From Euro Credit Crisis -- The global economy is slowing sharply and is at far greater risk of recession than was thought just months ago, with Europe’s debt crisis creating “fertile ground” for a rapid collapse, the International Monetary Fund warned Tuesday.
In a sobering trio of reports on growth, public debt and financial stability, the agency described global trade and investment as waning and depicted the world as perhaps one shock away from a serious downturn.”
Ook voorspelbaar
De recessie waar we in zitten. Hier al vaker gezegd – je kan jezelf niet rijk bezuinigen, maar je kan je wel een recessie in bezuinigen. Daarom is die strijd tussen de "austerity! roepers" en de meer "economie 101 voorstanders" (= laat de teugels vieren in een recessie, trek ze aan bij voorspoed) zo belangrijk. En gelukkig begint langzaam, heel langzaam, de invloed van de bezuinigers te tanen:
“Analysis - Unease as countries try to cut their way to health -- What do Nobel Prize-winning development economist Amartya Sen and IMF chief Christine Lagarde have in common? They both oppose the prevailing orthodoxy that all heavily indebted governments must cut their way back to prosperity as soon as they can. And they are not alone. Even as euro zone ministers thrash out the details of a "fiscal compact" requiring member states to run a more or less balanced budget over the course of an economic cycle, Italian Prime Minister Mario Monti is among those who have warned of the political risks posed by never-ending austerity.
He and others have called for a matching emphasis on growth, an agenda that European Union leaders will attempt to address at a summit in Brussels next Monday. Sen, an economics professor at Harvard University, said it was folly for governments to bend all their efforts to eliminate deficit spending. Apart from stoking democratic discontent, the "austerity disease" sweeping the West was killing the goose that laid the golden egg of growth.
"It is very hard to find adequately pragmatic grounds for severe austerity that cuts demand and makes economic expansion much more problematic," Sen said in a lecture at the London Stock Exchange last week. Sen suggested that some governments were opting for indiscriminate cuts for ideological reasons or even regarded debt reduction as a moral imperative.
If there is one institution that is ideologically associated with austerity in the public eye, it is the International Monetary Fund. Yet the IMF was an early advocate of pump-priming to cushion the 2008 economic slump and it continues to argue against blanket belt-tightening. "On fiscal policy, resorting to across-the-board, across-the continent, budgetary cuts will only add to recessionary pressures," IMF Managing Director Christine Lagarde said in Berlin on Monday. “
Minder goed voorspelbaar
In de markten kijken we nu weer volop naar Portugal, maar we zijn de Grieken nog niet vergeten. Hoe de strijd om de Griekse staatsobligaties zal aflopen is wel duidelijk (ze kunnen het niet betalen), maar waar de verliezen precies vallen en wanneer is minder duidelijk.
Verwachting is dat er, vanwege een snel aflopende obligatie, de komende weken een al dan niet tijdelijke oplossing tot stand zal komen. En de laatste berichten waren in de trant van een afschrijving van 50%, en van de rest wort 15% cash betaalt en 35% verlengd met 30 jaar tegen lage couponrente. Zoiets. Maar de jongste episode in de strijd gaat over waar de verliezen gaan vallen: “ ECB under pressure over Greek bond hit -
The International Monetary Fund has turned up pressure on European officials to take on more of the burden of filling a widening gap in Greece’s budget by pressing the European Central Bank to take a hit on its €40bn in Greek bond holdings, eurozone officials said. The ECB bought the bonds at below face value as part of a programme to prevent the collapse of Greek debt markets in 2010. It has also been accepting Greek bonds as collateral for cheap loans to teetering Greek banks. The bonds, with estimated yields in excess of 7 per cent, will provide a big return if Greece does not default and they are held to maturity. […] The IMF has concluded the €130bn bail-out plan for Greece agreed in October will no longer enable Athens to get its €350bn debt pile down to a sustainable level by 2020 – the plan’s principal goal. Unless bondholders agree to more losses, eurozone governments will have to find more bail-out loans to hit the target.”
Nieuw beleid
Vanavond komt het FOMC rentebesluit naar buiten. Zal wel unchanged zijn, de werkloosheid is nog veel te hoog en groei te laag, maar de aandacht zal vooral uitgaan naar de communicatie: “Fed Lets Investors Peer Into Its Crystal Ball -- Forget the results, focus on the guidance. That is a familiar refrain during earnings season. Now, it also is true of Federal Reserve decisions. On Tuesday, the Fed takes another historic step: At the conclusion of its two-day meeting, it will release detailed interest-rate projections for the first time. In other words, it will tell the public exactly what it plans to do with interest rates over the next several years. This is all part of the broader push Chairman Ben Bernanke has made toward improving Fed communication and transparency. Indeed, the chairman will take to the podium shortly after the new projections are issued Wednesday afternoon for one of his now-regular news conferences. And that will all follow the midday release of the Fed's statement, which used to be the main event.”
Jacob Jurg is verbonden aan AFS en verantwoordelijk voor nieuws en research. De informatie in deze column bevat geen individueel beleggingsadvies of aanbeveling tot het doen van bepaalde beleggingen.
